My Dear Senator Santorum,

First, let me introduce myself. I am a VOLUNTEER Weather Spotter in Riverton, Wyoming. I am also a non-tradition student, married with three children and a disabled wife, and we live in very rural Wyoming, attending Central Wyoming College.

I also run a web site that provides life saving information, as produced by the US Government, but only after I have digitized that which the government has NOT. I feel that the act mentioned in the subject line is NOT a Pennsylvania-Only topic. It is a NATIONWIDE issue. Therefore, I request that you take a moment to read this entire email.

I’ve recently been made aware of your proposed bill to limit access to the National Weather Service data online, so that ONLY for-profit organizations may use the data, and useless mouth breathing taxpayers like myself may NOT…because YOU want the National Weather Service to NOT do what YOU think the Private Sector can do better.

The Private Sector can NOT do better than the current National Weather Service is doing for ME, my family, and my fellow citizens.

Also, let me state right now, that the National Weather Service’s web site data, during the F5 Tornado that hit Jefferson County, Alabama, on April 8th, 1998 (7 years ago) helped ME to warn several families, possibly saving their lives, by warning them to conditions deteriorating before they headed home from church that night. Had this data not been online, who knows how many MORE people would have died?

Access to TIMELY weather information, ESPECIALLY for life saving data such as NEXRAD radar can provide, by way of the Internet, SHOULD BE TREATED exactly the same as the POSTAL SERVICE. Every address on every street in every town should have EQUAL access to the data…not just a few. Currently, the system provided by the NWS at

http://www.weather.gov

does a better than ANY private, for profit, corporate maintained system. It is MY daily check on MY local conditions, threats, and forecast without any external interference, advertising, or cost. It is also used by TENS of MILLIONS of other Americans, who, like myself, are TAXPAYERS.

The data provided by feeds such as the NWS does using XML technology also allows individuals, using freely available technology and web programming, to provide to MY web site visitors weather information that THEY can choose to control EXACTLY how they want to receive it, again, for FREE. I don’t charge for it, because the NWS doesn’t either. Visit MY WEATHER web site here….

http://weather.survivalring.org

I’ve read the ACT, as submitted here…

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:S.786:

Accuweather is headquartered in Pennsylvania…just like you…my, my…this sounds like a CONFLICT of INTEREST for the taxpaying citizens of AMERICA. Come on, what are the odds of that? Or, maybe it is simply pork barrel politics, but instead of your constituents, it is your collection of campaign financial supporters in the weather profit business who will gain the most in this legislation?

As Scott Bradner, a technical consultant at Harvard University says, that as he reads the bill, a vast amount of federal weather data would be forced offline.

“The National Weather Service Web site would have to go away,” Bradner said. “What would be permitted under this bill is not clear — it doesn’t say. Even including hurricanes.”

How infantile and self-serving is this? Right now, ANY American can access NWS data, radar, forecasts, warnings, weather email feeds, and more at the click of a mouse…WITHOUT having to wade through never ending advertisements, popup windows, inappropriate advertisements for Cialis, and the like.

Under your bill, if the NWS has to stop providing its TAXPAYER funded data feeds by way of its FREE web sites, WHO KNOWS how the “new” weather information providers will PROFIT from this legislation, with more and bigger advertisements…only covering the larger metro areas, and forgetting about the little people like me…who live hundreds of miles away from large cities and even interstates.

I won’t be able to get my weather for MY backyard, my farm, or my vacation, UNLESS I have the MONEY to go to a for-profit weather service information provider. Smacks very large and loud of ELITISM.

MY tax dollars, for the past 35 years of my career in the blue collar work force, have paid for weather satellites, NEXRAD radar systems, salaries of EVERY government employee, INCLUDING you and ME (I spent 10 years as a federal employee carrying the mail, and over 4 more years building defense electronics for the military), and the INTERNET (which still costs ME roughly $4 a DAY, paying for DSL, web site hosting, domain names, Premium Internet service at AOL), and finally for ALL of NASA’s support of the NWS with rockets, satellites, tracking and more.

Now YOU are wanting ME to pay MORE because LOBBYISTS for the value added Internet industry companies such as AccuWeather, Weather.com, and more….can make MY Internet usage even MORE irritating….instead of me getting CLEAN, CONCISE, and TIMELY information DIRECTLY from people I trust…namely the National Weather Service.

Why do you have to make it HARDER? Why can’t you make it EASIER for EVERY citizen to get NWS data EVERY day, for FREE, with free computers, free weather radios, or free Internet for EVERY SINGLE HOUSEHOLD in the nation? THAT would be a good use for MY TAXES.

The link below is making the rounds of the Internet, ESPECIALLY amongst responsible, concerned citizens.

http://www.palmbeachpost.com

“The bill, introduced last week by Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., would prohibit federal meteorologists from competing with companies such as AccuWeather and The Weather Channel, which offer their own forecasts through paid services and free ad-supported Web sites.”

As further comment, see what happened when ANOTHER nation did what YOU propose…

Please research what this has done in Australia and look to how many people have been killed already because of this type of plan. A good place to research is the “sydney to hobart race 1998.” That was a boat race but the organizers running the race relied on private weather information since the government had just started privatized the Bureau of Meteorology. The result was that 6 people died, several boats sank and the coast guard spent over 10 million dollars on rescue of the 115 boats. The total bill for “user pays weather” was $700 million dollars

You want Americans to die for the SAME reason…meaning BAD or OLD data, provided by PRIVATE companies who CAN’T do what the NWS does well?

Your Press Office release, here…

http://santorum.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressOffice.View&ContentRecord_id=1180

…doesn’t mention ANYTHING about average Americans losing access to FREE NWS weather information, as Mr. Bradner of Harvard states above. Why is that? An explanation of EXACTLY what the NWS would have to remove from public access and consumption would greatly assuage the current threat and fear that Americans like I may have about your
“possible” private thoughts regarding life saving data being taken away from us.

Why not put the laws and funding in place that protect us from TERRORISTS? Seems THAT is a MUCH bigger issue, and we could use EVERY person, company, private and public organization we can get to help CATCH the Bad Guys BEFORE they kill more of us…

I’d be glad to give you the name and number of a good friend who has a business near Dulles Airport, who watched the airliner screaming over Washington DC on 9/11, and heard the explosion occur at the Pentagon, and then hours later had HIS company visited by government agents to requisition his larger vehicles at his rental lot to help move victims to emergency care. You can ask him how long it took to wash the blood out of his vehicles.

In my opinion, as a US citizen, we need the weather system we have. We need the CURRENT access system via the Internet as well. It WORKS.

What we DON’T have is enough protection for our borders, for our museums, our precious families, and our nation. Of the two, which do YOU think could use every dollar we could give to IMPROVE service? Don’t take away the information that helps ME personally to have a safer day when it comes to bad weather.

Private organizations will not put up and maintain, AND replace, the satellites we currently have and use to keep us informed. What they will do is make it harder for my family and I to STAY safe in weather situations. If you do this, YOU are responsible for putting COUNTLESS Americans in peril, by TAKING AWAY TRUSTED information.

I beg of you to PLEASE withdraw this bill as it stands. Find a better way to IMPROVE the technology for forecasting and storm warning, BASED on what we already have in place. Don’t reinvent the wheel…streamline the wheels we have to work better, faster, and maybe cheaper.

THAT is what ALL Americans want.

Richard Fleetwood
Riverton, Wyoming
rafleet@gmail.com

Founder - SurvivalRing.org
“Study Yesterday…Prepare Today…Live Tomorrow.”

/* —– How to contact me —– */
Richard Fleetwood
Founder/Author/Programmer/Web Educator
FEMA Certificates - Radiological Emergency Mgt, Emergency Program Mgr.
Northwest Regional Director - United American Civil Taskforce (UACT)
Publications Director - Live-Free International, Inc.
Full time Collegiate Honor Student, Student Senator, Phi Theta Kappa Chapter President
Certified Storm Spotter
Creator of SurvivalRing, Civil Defense Now, MyFalloutShelter.com, and The Blast Shelter websites.
http://www.survivalring.org/ - The Big Site
http://www.survivalring.org/wordpress - My Personal Blog
http://members.aol.com/rafleet - My original Blast Shelter Site ( needs update! )